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Topic: Why are they doing this? (Read 1165 times)

:? I got another swarm call for a swarm that was on the deck of a house trailer. When I got there the man said that they had returned to the oak tree that was only about ten feet from the deck. He advised that this is the third time that they left the tree and landed on the deck in the last three days. Are they doing this because they are swarming without the queen, and then returning to the tree? There is a large split in the center of the tree, about five foot from the ground up. The split is about ten inches wide. I can many bees covering the split in the tree but there is a small split to the right of the big split where they are entering the center of the oak tree. I placed a swarm box on the deck where they have been swarming to to see if they will swarm again and enter the swarm box. If not I will try to vacuum as many bees as possible on Saturday and add them to a hive I have in my bee yard. Any suggestions on why these bees keep returning to the deck and back to the tree will be greatly appreciated.

Just a follow up on the returning bees. I went to the tree that they were in yesterday and vacuumed up as many as I was able to get out of the tree. I brought them home and added them to a hive that was not doing to good. They seem to be doing fine. I will go back to the tree next week and try to vacuum more of the bees. They are small bees of all colors. Very tame. There were hndreds of drones in the bunch. I hope to get the traits from the drones since I am unable to get to the queen herself.

Thanks for the suggestions, but I had already thought of leaving a swarm box on the deck. I left a swarm box where the had landed the previous times. I thought of the same thing. They may still swarm and if the swarm box is there I may catch the swarm. I hope that it works.